Former Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) acting Director John Sandweg on Friday said the Trump administration is “using ICE a political football” amid its widespread crackdown on immigrants and after an ICE officer shot and killed a U.S. citizen in Minneapolis this week.
Sandweg told MS NOW’s Katy Tur that he worries about the legitimacy of the investigation into Macklin Good’s death, but also said depoliticizing ICE could help with the agency’s relationship with the American people.
“Right now, I do think the administration is using ICE as a political football,” Sandweg said. “Immigration enforcement is always deeply political, but it has gone to new levels here where even a shooting like this, which I think we can all agree is a tragedy, has become an opportunity to divide the country more, pick sides. ‘Are you with the officer or are you not?’”
“I think we should be for the truth here,” he continued. “And be for what the investigation, you know, demonstrates for us. But I’d also say let’s return back to those tactics. Look, the Obama administration, as you noted, at that time, record-setting immigration enforcement, conversely. But it was focused.”
He said that the administration has ICE officers policing “against the protesters protesting them.”
“But at the end of the day, the real responsibility lies with the administration and the government to do what they can, and they can do the most of anyone, to deescalate the situation,” Sandweg told Tur.
Sandweg on Wednesday criticized Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem’s early claims following the shooting death of Renee Nicole Macklin Good in Minneapolis. Noem accused Macklin Good of attempting to run over ICE officer Jonathan Ross with her SUV, which Noem called an act of “domestic terrorism.”
“I find that to be an incredibly irresponsible statement,” Sandweg said on “CNN News Central.”
Sandweg added that initial information that the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) receives is “almost always wrong” and said the administration’s claims are a “disservice” to Macklin Good, her family and the credibility of DHS under Noem.
The shooting drew outrage from both sides of the political spectrum, with one side condemning ICE and the officer’s handling of the situation, and the other defending his actions and siding with Noem’s claims. President Trump and Vice President Vance both sided with the officer, with Vance accusing people on social media of “gaslighting.”
“A tragedy? Absolutely,” Vance wrote in one post on the social platform X. “But a tragedy that falls on this woman and all of the radicals who teach people that immigration is the one type of law that rioters are allowed to interfere with.”
Vance on Thursday lashed out at reporters at the White House for the media’s reporting on the shooting, calling it an “absolute disgrace.”
Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey (D) backed peaceful protests in his city, which drew hundreds of people following Macklin Good’s death. Hours after she was killed, Frey told ICE at a press conference to “get the f— out of Minneapolis.”
On Saturday, Minneapolis police reported 30 people were detained the night before after the department said demonstrators threw snow, ice and rocks at officers, police vehicles and other vehicles in the roadway.
